@Mercfh: I was the downvoter - and I did so because the question completely lacks insight, research and experience while propagating uninformed use of buzzwords. I wasn't going to openly hate on the OP, but now that you've asked... I guess I have to be the bad guy.
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Steve EversMar 18 '11 at 17:44

4 Answers
4

Architecturally there is nothing to prevent you from building this. I would, however, recommend building a web service (or WCF app) for your Winform app to call instead of directly calling the database from the app.

We've had a lot of success building MS Click-Once smart clients that do exactly that. Separating out the code that calls to the DB isolates your Winform app from having to know what SQL to use. Additionally, if at somepoint down the road the business requirements change and you need to build a web app instead (or in addition to) the Winform app, your new web app can call the same web service and be up and running that much quicker.

+1: It's a safe bet to use that architecture even if you're only planning for LAN deployment. It's easily developed, easily secured, has the opportunity to scale well, and supports internet deployment.
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Steve EversMar 18 '11 at 14:58

One thing to keep in mind. I recently attended Azure training and as was pointed out by the instructor some countries legally require you to keep your database on-site. You can host your application in the cloud, but the database has to reside on company grounds.

That said I'm not sure what the cloud gets you that hosing the web site/service on-site doesn't. Nothing that you've posted so far indicates to me that the cloud is the appropriate decision. What are your needs? Remote access can just as easily be done on-site.